After drinks came the ink: Tattoo proclaims UK as next year’s national champions

One Wildcats fan is showing his faith in the 2018 University of Kentucky men’s basketball team in a big and rather permanent way.

Joseph Tucker, 21, of Augusta said he was on vacation with a few friends on Friday when, after a day of drinking at a bar in Myrtle Beach, S.C., they decided to get tattoos. Tucker said he remembered going into the tattoo parlor, but he didn’t count on actually going through with his plan.

“I guess one thing led to another,” Tucker said. “We talked about getting tattoos, and I didn’t think I’d get one, but I woke up the next morning and it was there.”

The tattoo is on his arm and features the UK emblem with the words “2018 National Champions.”

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His friends approved of the decision, but Tucker said he’s not sure if his family knows how to react to his first tattoo.

Tucker said he’s confident that his inked prediction will come true, but if it doesn’t, he plans to modify the tattoo to honor the 2012 championship team.

“I grew up my whole life as a Kentucky fan. I’m pretty confident in them every year,” he said. “You probably won’t find a bigger Kentucky fan than me.”

This isn’t the first time a UK fan has taken high hopes all the way to the tattoo artist’s chair. Tyler Austin Black, who was 22 at the time, got a tattoo on his calf in 2014 proclaiming a ninth national championship for the team.

Black told ESPN that he planned on keeping that tattoo, even though the Wildcats lost to Connecticut in the championship game.